re: Do you have any wild family legends about how you came to exist?

My 5th great grandfather stole a slave in Mississippi and took him to Alabama and rented the slave out for $10 a month. When he was caught they were going to hang him, but the probate judge stepped in and demanded that he go to trial. He served his time in prison then got out and banged his wife.
Now I have to go to work everyday and pay taxes to an elite group of pedophiles.

not a family legend because I didn't know until recently, but doing genealogy on my family history discovered a book about my direct lineage that included maps. The first British soldiers off the boat in The War of 1812 on their way to storm Washington was on my family's plantation in Benedict, Maryland. They burnt it to the ground as they passed through, my remaining ancestors sold off their plantation for a penny, and traveled west to Ohio where they met up with other parts of my family tree

Its crazy how if not for all of these events big and small, had they gone differently, I would not exist.

*yes, I'm one of the Americans who's entire family tree was riddled with slave owners. I'm fricked if anyone ever passes reparations as my maiden name is probably one of the blackest last name in the country. I can usually find it on the back of any sports jersey and its like getting a custom jersey without the price.

My grandmother picked up my grandfather while he was hitchhiking home after getting out of the Navy. They were married 2 weeks later.

Not wild but definitely a chance encounter that led to my being here.

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So, a pretty circuitous route just to get me here.

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Thumbs up for using the word ‘circuitous’ in a sentence .. classes this place up a little bit .

It was a clear black night, a clear white moon. My dad was on the streets, trying to consume.

My grandmothers first husband was killed by a lightning strike. She met my grandpa shortly after and the rest is history. I find it funny that something with really long odds is compared to being struck by lightning and that's literally the only reason I exist today haha.

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great, great, great, great grandfather

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great, great, great grandmother

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So your great x4 grandfather banged your great x3 grandmother?

As in he banged his daughter in law?

The OG BawPaw

When my great grandfather and his brother were in the Greek army, they wanted to make it in America because they had grown up with war along the Macedonian border, and the family was poor.

Family legend is they flipped a coin to see which brother would go to America first to get settled, make money, and send for the rest of the family later. My great grandfather won and left.

Shortly after, Congress passed the Immigration Act of 1924 which set strict quotas on immigrants from Eastern Europe and other parts of the world, so the rest of the family couldn't get in. The brother ended up going to Australia instead, and I still have cousins there today.

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they still have a plague with his name at the church

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Umm, I think you meant plaque.

Only thing I have is that both my parents lost their fathers as young children (my mom’s dad while she was still in the womb) and they grew up in the middle of the Great Depression fatherless. My grandmothers are my heroes.